Sep

7

Music to my ears

September 7, 2006

The sound of a baby crying is, I suppose, biologically designed to bore holes into your brain tissue. That’s evolution, right? Developing the sort of noise that makes nearby adult humans (and certain dogs) drop everything they’re doing in order to make it stop, make it stop, feed it or pat it or do something, jesus, just make it stop.

When Riley starts crying I want to remedy the situation for some legitimate loving-parent reasons: he’s probably tired or hungry and I want to make him feel better. But secretly, the most important reason of all is because it’s an awful goddamn sound and it will give you a migraine in five seconds flat.

During the process of cobbling together little clips for his birthday video, I kept watching the footage of him as a much smaller baby, propped in his bouncy chair and bleating out a tiny cry. “Mmmmeeehhhhhh,” he says on the video, for all the world like a newborn goat. That was as loud as he got back then! Man, talk about the good old days.

Now, he can pretty much flatten redwoods and boil the oceans with his mighty screams. Sometimes he breaks out the big guns for no good reason, like when I’m wrestling him into an outfit, and I try saying “Riley” in a gentle, chiding tone. As in “Riley, for the love of christ shut your flipping yap before Mommy stuffs a throw pillow in there,” but, like, abbreviated. I’m comforting and all, but still sort of letting him know that it’s not necessary to unleash the Audio Hounds of Hell just because of some feetie pajamas, you know?

This works spectacularly, assuming my intent is to crank him up past eleven into Mad Hornet Mode. The gentle, chiding tone pisses him right the hell off. I find myself wondering how much of his future little-kid personality we are seeing right now, and how much is standard baby operating procedure. Because he just might turn into the sort of little boy who sets things on fire with his mind. I’m just saying.

People say that angry babies are funny, but I bet they haven’t had to share a 6-hour car ride with one. Yeah, it’s all fun and games until your eardrums rupture.

There is one thing he does when he’s upset that is pretty hilarious, though. Sometimes, usually when one of us walks away from him while he’s crawling around, he will collapse his front half onto the floor while his little rear stays poking up in the air. His head buried between his arms, he wails inconsolably. It is pitiful, and deeply entertaining. Of course, once I pick him up he immediately drops the boneless-chicken slump and starts kicking ferociously, aiming for my C-section scar, which is less amusing and more, hmmm, what’s the word for “needing to be dropped into a wood chipper”? I mean that in a loving maternal way of course.

This morning Riley had himself a little meltdown about being prepped with a fresh diaper, then he got mad about sitting in his highchair, then he was ticked off because JB left the living room. But then? He said “bah bye” when he was being walked out the door in JB’s arms, as I waved to him. That’s Darwinism too, you know — the colossal amounts of cuteness continue to keep him far away from that wood chipper.

FOR NOW.

:::

2 small things:

1) Remember how I was all “blah blah blah Cruel Girl jeans rock blah”? Well, you can get yourself a pair for a very affordable price on this website right now. I’m not positive that the jeans on there are the same exact style as the ones I own and love, but if you’re looking to check out the brand, there you go. I just bought myself a pair of the capri jeans off that site today, so I’ll let you know how they work out. (Thanks for the tip, Jenny!)

2) I sent JB an IM the other day to ask a basic math question (something embarrassingly retarded that I would know if I’d taken any classes past “Addition and Subtraction: Remedial Elements”). I apologized for the stupidness of my query, and this is what he wrote back:

soon to be famous writers are usually not good at math – that is why they marry math dorks like me who like spreadsheets and porn

I thought about it, and I believe the only thing that JB might find more appealing than some kind of porn/spreadsheet combination is if it somehow also included power tools.

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Sep

6

Crikey, he was a beaut

September 6, 2006

I’ve been listening to a lot of really good music lately, thanks to you guys. Snow Patrol, Keane, Imogen Heap, Goldfrapp, The Sounds, Some Girls, OK Go…my iPod has been completely rejuvenated.

Embarrassingly, this morning I chose to bypass all those quality tunes in favor of Guns N’ Roses, in order to sing along with “Rocket Queen” at the top of my damn lungs. Do you ever pretend that the music you’re listening to is the soundtrack for a scene in a movie, starring you? Like:

INT. TOYOTA COROLLA, DAYTIME

LINDA sits behind the wheel, her eyes narrowed against the bright morning sunlight. She REACHES for the volume control on the car stereo and cranks it up.

LINDA
(off-pitch)
I might be a little young but honey…

Outside, random OTHER DRIVERS cover their ears, pained expressions on their faces. BIRDS fall from the sky, stunned.

LINDA (CONT’D)
…I ain’t naiiiive…

Well, I didn’t say it would be a good movie.

So let’s pretend we’re all hanging around the water cooler here; boy, how about that Steve Irwin? What a sad, oddball reminder that we’re all just one random smiting away from the big dirt nap. I mean, here’s a guy who spent most of his life thrusting his face into the gaping maws of deadly crocodiles, yelling about how they’re real beauties and crikey what a ripper, and he dies not from being ground up as a crocbait but from a stingray, what the fuck. I swam with those things at Grand Cayman once, had I any idea they could barb you in the goddamn heart I probably would have done much less ray-petting and far more swimsuit-pooping.

We heard about the Crocodile Hunter story while we were at JB’s family’s cabin on Monday, and when JB’s brother was talking to JB’s mother on the phone (he was elsewhere) there was the following amusing exchange:

JB: “Tell Joe the crocodile hunter died!”
JB’s mom: “Oh, and Joe? Crocodile Dundee is dead.”
JB: “No, the croc hunter.”
JB’s mom: “Joe? The croco– the crocodile.”
Me (enjoying the confusion): “That’s not a knife.”
JB’s mom: “Just a minute, Joe. (to me) What?”
Me: (oblivious, talking to myself): “Heh. I see you’ve played knifey-spooney before.”
JB: “The crocodile hunter, Mom!”
JB’s mom: “Joe? Joe?”

Last night JB turned to me apropos of nothing and said, “Man, I am bummed about that crocodile guy”. I know what he means, it’s weirdly depressing. Maybe someone will make September 4 Croc Hunter Day and we can all wear khaki shorts in honor of Big Steve.

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